


Second Robin 101: An Austere Approach To Knowledge

by LananiA3O



Series: Batman: Arkham Compendium [2]
Category: Batman - All Media Types, Batman: Arkham (Video Games)
Genre: Big sister Babs, Gen, Swearing, past trauma, robin!jason
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-30
Updated: 2018-03-30
Packaged: 2019-04-03 23:39:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,166
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14007357
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LananiA3O/pseuds/LananiA3O
Summary: Barbara is supposed to help Jason catch up on his lost years of academic progress, but Jason has only been living in the manor for two weeks and 'trust' is not yet in his vocabulary. When the first home-tutoring session goes awry, Babs decides that a change of scenery might be in order...





	Second Robin 101: An Austere Approach To Knowledge

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Cerusee](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cerusee/gifts).



> Written for the amazing Cerusee, who has been reading and reviewing my stories literally since day 1, by commenting on my very first fic on AO3 on the day it was published and almost everything I've written ever since. She asked for a Compendium fic with "Jason getting excited about The Knowledge, and Babs enjoying Jason being his nerd self", preferably with Robin!Jason. So here we go with an expansion on the beginning of "Compensating" chapter 2.
> 
> I hope you like it, Cerusee, and thank you so much for all your support throughout the last two years! :) *hugs*
> 
> For status updates, writing trivia, fandom/fanfiction/writing related questions and occasional random ramblings, please visit my tumblr: http://lananiscorner.tumblr.com/

His name was Jason Todd. He was thirteen years old. He had dropped out of school when he was eight. Bruce wanted her to help him catch up on his academic and social skills. The phone call had hardly been a request. More of an order really.

Barbara wanted to grab Bruce and fold him like an accordion.

Jason’s attitude hadn’t helped. Gruff, passive-aggressive, uncooperative, constantly distrustful. Alfred had warned her about that. He had had the decency to give her some information at least – that Jason had grown up in a troubled household, that he had spent almost six years living on the streets of Park Row. Not that she wouldn’t have been able to tell that by his accent, but the warning had been nice.

It was not enough to keep her from wanting to fold up Jason either.

It had been almost half an hour now, since she had invited him into her apartment, made him a cup of black coffee, and joined him on the couch, and Jason had yet to say a single word to her. He had his nose buried in a book – a book that he had carefully wrapped in a sleeve made of newspaper – and only raised it once in a while to sip from his coffee or jot down a few notes. She had tried to decipher those from a distance, but Jason’s handwriting was frankly atrocious.

If Bruce was to ask her what they did during their first tutoring session and all she could tell him was ‘I sat and sipped tea while Jason read some book’, Bruce was going to crucify her.

“So, what are you reading?”

Jason flinched, then lowered the book just enough to peek over the top of the page and glare at her. “A book.”

“Smartass.” Barbara rolled her eyes. She wanted to sigh and facepalm, too, but she had a feeling that would only set Jason off. Even from the few sentences they had exchanged so far it was easy to tell that Jason was a rather temperamental sort.

The kind she usually deliberately avoided, unless she was in costume and had good reason to punch them in the face anyway.

“I’m just trying to get a sense of what I’m supposed to be tutoring you in, Jason,” Barbara tried again. “Alfred said Bruce set you up with private teachers? I’m sure they set up a course plan for you. If you could let me have a look at it, I could—“

“It’s none of your _fuckin’_ business!” There it was. The temper. Barbara cringed. And the Park Row accent. “Yeah, I got a course plan. No, you’re not gonna fuckin’ see it. No, I don’ need your help. I don’ care how you ‘xplain this to Bruce either. Just leave me the fuck alone.”

This time, Barbara did let out a sigh. Jason didn’t seem to care. He just retreated back into the couch as far as he could and pulled up his legs for good measure. It was like watching a particularly grumpy, spiked turtle retreat into its shell.

Barbara frowned, picked up her phone, and dialed Alfred’s number. “Hey Alfred, it’s Barbara.” Jason flinched again. So did Barbara when Alfred immediately asked if Jason had escaped from her apartment and run off into the city. He had barely been with Bruce for two weeks. Had he pulled that stunt already? “Oh no no no! Everything’s fine.” Barbara took a deep breath. “I was just wondering if you had a copy of Jason’s academic curriculum and if you could pass it on to me, please.”

“Oh, fuck you!” Jason threw the book aside and lunged forward, but evading was easy. He had guts and determination, but clearly Bruce hadn’t even begun training him yet. His ‘attack’ was crude and utterly predictable. Barbara shifted to the left, hooked her ankles around his throat, and pinned him to the couch in one fluid movement. The throw had been easy, too, and telling as well. She now knew that Jason was far, far too lightweight for his age.

“Oh no, Alfred, it’s fine.” Barbara gave a quick grin. “We’re all good here. Yes. Just send it to my phone. Thank you, Alfred. Bye bye.”

“I fuckin’ _hate_ you.”

Jason’s fingers were scratching and pushing at her leg. She kept the hold just as long as it took her to figure out where the book had landed, then let him go and went for the tome. Jason retreated behind his part of the couch, rubbing his throat, and eyeing her like he wanted to murder her. Barb felt the grin fade from her face.

“Did I hurt you?”

“No!”

That answer had come too fast, but she had seen enough bruised egos, especially among teenage boys, to know that addressing it right now would only make it worse. Instead, Barbara opened the book and read the copyright information.

“ _The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe?_ ” Barbara raised an eyebrow. “Man, I haven’t read that one in a long time. Don’t see why you wouldn’t let me have a look at it, though.”

Jason scowled and for a moment he looked just like Bruce. That probably was the most troubling thing about him so far. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

“I’m not.” Barb sat down again and put the book on the table. “I honestly don’t get it. Help me out here, Jason? Please?”

Jason’s eyes narrowed, mustering her as if to figure out whether this was a cheap trick or not. Eventually, he crossed his arms in front of his chest and looked away. “It’s a fuckin’ kid’s book.”

“You are thirteen, Jason.”

“It’s recommended readin' for third and fourth grade!”

“Which is precisely when you stopped going to school regularly.”

Jason rolled his eyes at her. “You don’ fuckin’ get it, do you?” He started using the edge of his hand on the couch for punctuation. “It’s. A Book. For fourth graders. I’m _thirteen_.”

 _And so clearly definitely too old for C. S. Lewis_ , Barbara continued mockingly in her head. Thankfully, another thought occurred to her before that one made it to her tongue.

Under normal circumstances, Barbara would have considered this a clear-cut case of toxic masculinity. Of course he couldn’t be reading kid’s literature as a teenage boy! That would be girly and childish and weak and all those other ridiculous adjectives that no boy over the age of twelve wanted to be associated with. But with Jason, Barbara had the distinct feeling that it was not just posturing. He _had been_ living on the streets for a long time, where weakness meant blood and pain. For normal boys, this would have been a matter of pride. For Jason, it was self-preservation.

“That doesn’t mean you can’t learn anything from it,” Barbara tried to suggest in her gentlest voice. “Do you know what ‘inquisitive’ means? Or ‘dominion’? Or ‘stratagem’? Because those are all in that book.”

“They are also in the fuckin’ dictionary,” Jason lobbed back. “Under ‘I’, ‘D’ and ‘S’, I’d guess.”

“Fair enough.” He was smart. Barbara had to give him that. “But there is so much more you can learn from fiction – even fiction written for children. It helps us learn about ourselves, about human nature and how we relate to the world. It helps us explore worlds and ideas we would not have access to otherwise.”

“I don’ care, Barbie!” Jason looked at her as if she had just insulted everything about him. “I have enough to fuckin’ deal with right in the here and now and if I wanna find out about ‘human nature’, I’ll just… you know… go talk to some fuckin’ humans.”

She watched him march off into the kitchen just as Alfred’s text arrived. _Bless that man and his impeccable timing!_ Barbara doubted that approaching Jason now would be a good idea. Even though she did have an overwhelmingly strong urge to deck him in the face for calling her "Barbie".

The curriculum was pretty packed, but more importantly it looked like a good match for third grade material, with the addition of Spanish and early science reading. That had most likely been Bruce’s idea, although Barbara doubted Jason would object.

He wasn’t averse to the idea of learning, that much was for sure. Barbara could tell from the bookmark on page sixty-four and the notes on the pad he had brought. He didn’t hate books either. No-one who hated books would bother to wrap them in a protective sleeve, even if the sleeve was made from something as crude as an old newspaper. Bruce and Alfred would probably have supplied him with proper plastic sleeves, if he had asked, but Barbara doubted the thought had occurred to him. Plastic had to be bought. It was an expense. Old newspaper was just recycling. Cost-saving. He had probably learned a lot about that, even before ending up on the streets.

Barbara sank back into the couch and rubbed her temples. She suppressed the groan that wanted to come with the headache.

This was going to go nowhere. For Jason, it was embarrassing enough that he had to start with third-grade material. He would not take well to her trying to help. Still, she could not just send him home without doing something. Bruce wouldn’t understand. He had been born with a silver spoon in his mouth and while he defended the poor of Gotham just as much as the rich, he had never been there. He could be sympathetic, but not empathic.

Barbara on the other hand? She remembered when her father had been just a detective and freshly divorced. It hadn’t been easy. Hell, these days she spent every other day in a library, helping out people who could not afford to buy their kids ‘An Introduction to Chemistry, Revision 26’, when Revision 12 from the library said pretty much the same thing only with slightly different page numbers. It was a scam that preyed on the poor and Barbara had seen it often enough to know how to work around it.

_The library…_

Perhaps she could salvage this evening after all. Barbara took a deep breath, re-centered herself, and got up slowly.

Jason was in the kitchen, leaning against the counter with a glass of water in his hand and a look of utter misery in his eyes. He gave the slightest hint of a nod to acknowledge he had seen her when she entered, then promptly went back to his half-empty glass.

“So... I have an idea...” Barbara headed for the fridge and took out the two guacamole burritos she had saved for dinner. She handed one of them over and wasn’t surprised when Jason eyed it suspiciously. He probably wasn’t used to free food. “Go on. It’s not poisoned.”

She took a bite of her own and watched Jason all but devour his portion. That, too, made sense. On the streets, every minute spent waiting was likely a chance to have someone try and claim his spoils for themselves.

“I work at the library in the Cauldron. We could go there and get you some new books. Something that’s not for kids. Something that’s not fiction. Something you’re actually interested in.”

Jason seemed to ponder it for a few seconds. There was a spark in his eyes now, something hopeful that she hadn’t expected seeing. Sadly, he didn’t seem convinced. “And how exactly does that fall under ‘tutoring’?”

That was a good question. Barbara took another bite from her half-gone burrito. She’d have to find some way to justify this to Bruce. At least until Jason had a few more hours of private lessons under his belt to show that third-grade material really was a piece of cake for him and he would be ready for more.

“We could pass it off as an introduction to academic research and information processing.” Jason laughed at that, but Barb just continued eating. “I’m serious.” She took another bite. “Research skills are important. You don’t have to know everything, but you should know where you can find the information you’re lacking.”

“You think that’s gonna be enough for the Bat?”

Barbara finished her burrito and washed her hands. Now, it was her turn to cross her arms and harden her stare. “One: it was Bruce who told me to tutor you, not Batman. Two: if he thinks it isn’t, I’ll _make it_ be enough. Don’t ever underestimate a pissed off librarian.”

***

They arrived at the library exactly eight minutes before closing time and Emily, who had gotten stuck with the dreaded solo evening shift tonight, looked at her as if she wanted to murder her.

Barbara answered with a smile. “Hey, Emmy! What’s up?”

“Please tell me you two know exactly what you’re looking for.”

“We have absolutely no idea what we’re looking for,” Barbara admitted, but I promise I won’t mind if you come over at nine, on the dot, so you can sign out and I can sign in. And I’ll watch my friend here like a mother hawk, so if anything goes wrong, it’s all on me.”

For a moment, Emily seemed to want to argue. Then, another customer stepped forward and she muttered a quick ‘alright, alright’ into Barbara’s direction and that was good enough. Barb headed towards the lockers, always keeping an eye on Jason, to make sure he didn’t wander off. She wouldn’t put it past him to try and ditch her in the crowds.

Getting Jason to hand over and lock up his jacket and all its contents was a challenge, to say the least. Barb did her best to keep her frustration off her face and out of her voice, as she kept on reminding herself that Jason’s stubbornness was likely not the sign of a jerk, but rather years of learned fear for the safety of his possessions. In the end, she let him keep his keys and wallet, but insisted on ditching his jacket and phone. Jason handed them over with a territorial look to match a starving wolf and insisted that he be the one who gets to carry the key. Barb let it go with a quick roll of her eyes.

At this point, the library was almost empty and so Barbara did not bother to tell Jason to pick his jaw up from the floor when they finally left the entrance area and headed into the proper halls of knowledge. It wasn’t even the biggest library in Gotham. Not even close. Three levels, each sixty-by-sixty feet was not a lot, even though the shelves had been arranged as economically as possible.

To Jason, it might, apparently, just as well have been the Central Library in Bristol.

“Jesus...” He approached the spiral stairs in the center of the room that connected the three floors with short, hesitant steps. “How many books are there?”

“In this library... about twenty-thousand books, one-thousand magazines, and roughly five-hundred assorted DVDs and games.”

“Twenty-thou—“ Jason reached for the nearest book shelf and looked at it in stunned wonder. Barbara wondered if she should tell him that this was the tail end of the ‘self-help and motivationals’ section. “I remember my old school in Park Row. We had five dingy, wormy shelves and about a hundred books that almost fell apart when you touched them.”

Barbara grimaced at that. Park Row was always on the bottom of the funding pile. More likely than not, Jason’s school library had consisted of nothing but decades old donations and books bequeathed by the grieving parents of children who had gotten shot on the way to, or even worse at, school. It was an unfortunately common thing in Park Row.

“Well, why don’t I give you the general tour then, and then I’ll tell you how to actually search for stuff in the computer rooms?”

“You have computers here?”

“Well, yeah.” Barb gave a quick snort. “How do you think people search for books? Going down the rows one by one? Come on.”

She resisted the urge to grab him by the arm – probably a very, very bad idea – and just started walking and talking. It was almost automatic. She had given this introduction to hundreds of groups of school children and individual first-timers who did not know fiction from academia. She could have done this in her sleep.

TO her surprise, Jason followed without a word. Gone was the hostility. Gone was the apprehension. Gone was the feinted disinterest. For once, Jason was clinging to her every word and somehow that only made her more enthusiastic in her narration.

They started with the first floor, where most of what Barbara liked to call “everyday non-fiction” was housed. From self-help to pet care to manuals to DIY instructions to easy-to-understand tax return guide books, everything that could potentially be of use in daily life was housed here, sorted by category, then author. She had expected that to be the least impressive part and yet Jason seemed both fascinated and confused by the sheer breadth of material.

“ _Green Thumb Masters – Lawn and Garden Maintenance from A to Z_.” Jason had picked the book off the shelf at random and was thumbing through it with perplexion written all over his face. “Who the fuck actually has a lawn _and_ a garden in Gotham?”

Barbara shrugged. “Bruce?”

That made Jason laugh a little, even as his eyes darted back to the shelf, nervously searching for the spot he had taken the book from. With every second that he couldn’t find it, his frown deepened. “Shit. Where did I...”

“It’s ok, Jason.” She pointed at the nearby cart. “Just put the book over here and Emily will sort it back in when she does her final round.”

Jason stared at her, shocked and just a little angry, as if he was expecting it to be some kind of trick. Barbara didn’t even want to imagine what must have happened to him in his childhood to make the mere idea of leaving things in a disorderly state seem like a crime.

“It’s okay, Jason. Really. Sorting in misplaced books is part of the job description and it’s better if you put it in the cart, rather than some random spot in the shelves. At least in the cart we can find it again.”

That seemed to be convincing enough, at least for the moment. She waited until he had placed the book, then moved on while filing that new indication of horrors past away in her brain for another day. Someday later, when Jason had actually come to trust her at least a little. Everything in its time. She also made sure to explain how the library had two copies of each book – one to read here only and one to rent. That way, even if he had horribly misplaced _Green Thumb Masters – Lawn and Garden Maintenance from A to Z_ , they would still have one copy to hand out.

The second floor with its fiction section was next. Jason seemed surprised to find out that it wasn’t sorted by topic, like the previous floor, but that was about as far as the extent of his curiosity reached. As observed in her apartment, Jason appeared to be significantly less interested in anything that was nothing but someone else’s made-up stories. It still frustrated her, but Barbara knew better than to push. One could not force another person to find pleasure in reading, just like one could not force another to find pleasure in art, or theater, or opera, or even music in general. She had seen the results of that during her own English classes in school – children who had grown up in a household of readers or who already enjoyed fiction thrived with reading lists. Those who hadn’t only grew to despise books when previously they had been indifferent at worst and the quickest way to turn any young teenager off literature forever was to _force_ them to read Hamlet.

She was not here to make Jason despise books.

The second floor also included a reading hall and Barbara made sure to read him the rules. No talking, no eating, no drinking. This was a place of silent enjoyment. Jason scoffed.

“I get that you’re trying to make sure no-one accidentally spills their soder cola over the damn Christmas Carol, but do you have to run this room like a prison?”

Barbara felt the laughter bubble up in her throat and swallowed it right back down. Had that just been a joke? Or had the room evoked something worse in Jason, triggered another painful memory? She wasn’t sure.

“Well, if you don’t mind a bit of noise and the rentable copy is gone, you can always plop down on one of the window sills or one of the oversized floor cushions by shelves."

“Noise doesn’t bother me.” Jason shrugged his shoulders. _But silence does_ , was the unspoken addendum. She supposed it made sense. Jason had lived on the streets for a long time and just like New York, Gotham never slept. There was always some noise – shouting, walking, engines, sirens, or even just the incessant prattling of the rain on the asphalt. True silence was hard to come by in the city.

She wondered how well Jason slept in the manor.

The third floor was completely deserted and someone had even switched off the lights already. Barbara flicked them back on and started the tour. Here, on the academic floor, books were actually sorted by discipline, from A for Aerospace to Z for Zoology, every shelf had at least one tag for a scientific branch. Jason studied them as intently as he could, what with the pace Barbara had set on their way to the research room. It wasn’t that she was trying to rush him through all of it, but she knew the lab was the last place Emily would check and she wanted to be there when it happened.

“And this is the heart of our library,” Barbara announced as she lead him into the little room with the fifteen computers, hidden away on the far side of the third floor.

“This?” Jason raised an eyebrow. “Ain’ a single book here.”

“No, there isn’t,” Barbara agreed, “but here is where you can find out where they actually are.”

She booted up the closest machine and sighed at the slow-as-a-snail boot up sequence. With just a little more funding she could upgrade these machines in no time, but of course the city was strapped for cash. It was always strapped for cash.

Jason grabbed another chair and started hunching down next to her just as she entered the guest account credentials.

She started with the standard database, explaining the search function to him with all its simplified and advanced functions and fields, including the ISBN. Another thing that no-one ever seemed to have bothered teaching Jason. She also showed him all the neat little tricks – how to directly access the floor plan from any book, how to crosscheck for the same book in different libraries, and how to make sense of the seemingly random number sequence at the bottom of each book entry that denoted the current status of availability.

Halfway through the explanation, Emily came by to tell Barb to clock in so she could clock out. Barbara nodded and handed the mouse and keyboard over to Jason. “I’ll be back in just a minute to explain the academic database to you, ok?”

Jason nodded and Barbara left. Emily asked a hundred questions and she did her best to deflect them. She was sure Jason had enough unwanted attention already. The press had descended like flies upon Dick only three years ago, what with his... unusual background and the dramatic circumstances of his ‘adoption’. She could only imagine how much bullshit Jason was forced to go through right now.

When she returned to the data room, Jason was lost in the light of the screen.

“Found something you like?”

“Couple o’ things,” Jason muttered almost on automatic. Barbara plopped down into the chair next to him and had to laugh.

“Couple o’ things like a basket of thirty-two books?” For a moment, she didn’t quite believe the number in the top right of the screen, but there it was. Three. Two. Jason had been busy. Also... “Hang on a second.” Barb’s eyes narrowed. “That’s the academia database.”

“Sure is.”

Barbara wanted to laugh. She understood now. As she watched Jason navigate through the maze that was AcaLib’s citation web and its ‘diversified fields’ function, it finally dawned on her that she had made the same mistakes as Jason’s teachers had. She had shown him the basics and had expected him to stick with them. She hadn’t even entertained the notion of showing him the advanced stuff, too convinced that it would require much more explanation, yet Jason seemed to be just fine. He had the on-board dictionary open with a search query for the word ‘interdependent’ and she would have bet her own book collection that he had been using it to look up any word the database spewed at him that didn’t make sense. Yet.

Jason may not have the knowledge yet, but he knew how to cope. He knew how to patch up the holes and how to keep moving forward, obstacles be damned. Barbara supposed that had been a useful skill on the streets, too.

“I think I’m done,” Jason eventually explained with a deep breath. “Unless you want to quiz me on this thing?”

Barbara pondered it for a minute. “If I were to tell you that I read a really interesting article about jade pottery in ancient China once, but I couldn’t, for the life of me, remember the author or the title of the book, only that it was a massive four-hundred-something page monster that you could use to club people to death with – how would you find it?”

Jason frowned. He didn’t speak as he erased his own search and started fresh, navigating through keywords searches, cross-references, and every synonym in the thesaurus. He didn’t speak, but by the end of the search, he had only two books in the tray. He grabbed a pencil and paper from the supply stack in the middle of the and jotted down the relevant titles and authors.

“You’ll find it in section A for Art History, out the door, hard left, third shelf.”

This time, Barbara did laugh. He was spot-on. If she followed his advice, she’d have the relevant book in under two minutes. “And what if it’s already been rented?”

“Then you read the stationary copy.”

“But...” Barbara put on her best uptalk. “But that’s like... so hard? I don’t have time to sit around in a stupid library all day?”

“Well, the books got more brains than you then,” Jason muttered as he opened the cross-search directory and noted down the addresses and shelf numbers of other Gotham libraries that stocked rentable copies of the book. “There ya go. And now ya know why I’ll never work in customer service.”

“Because you’ve got healthy self-preservation instincts,” Barbara grinned while Jason printed the full list in his basket – he had eventually reached forty-nine items. “That’s a lot of reading.”

“I don’ plan on readin’ all of it.” Jason headed for the printer and returned with three fully printed pages. “But unless there’s a nifty little function for findin’ excerpts in that database, I don’ know if I’ll want to rent these until I’ve looked at them.”

That too was a smart decision. Barbara had seen enough people rent out entire stacks of books, even up to the maximum of thirty at a time, only to bring back half of them the day later with looks of humiliation and regret on their faces when the material turned out to be too scientific. She shut down the pc as Jason headed out, switched off the lights, and locked the room.

The first section Jason headed for was E for Engineering. She watched him zone in on a specific shelf with the assured precision of a sniper and swipe the magazine as fast as any pickpocket in Crime Alley could. Jason thumbed through _Pioneering Engineering_ issue 1, frowned, and put it back on the shelf. _An Introduction to Engineering_ was next. This time, his brow didn’t furrow quite as much, but she was not surprised to see him make a beeline for the English section afterwards and grab the heaviest dictionary he could find.

F for Forensics was the second section. Barbara froze.

“Jason...” He didn’t set down the first issue of _The American Forensic Journal_ , but at least he looked up. “I know I said I was going to pass this off as database and research work to Bruce... but that doesn’t mean you have to stick to job-related stuff. This was supposed to be fun. You know. So you could pick what you’re interested in.”

“And what’s tellin’ you I’m not interested in how long it takes for a submerged body to decompose at barely above freezing temperatures?”

Barbara resisted the urge to facepalm just long enough for Jason to turn around and continue scouring the forensics shelf. She wanted to ask what was wrong with this boy, but she had a terrible gut feeling that she already knew. Suddenly, the anger sparked bright hot inside her gut.

“Well, I’ll go downstairs and get everything set up for you to check out those books. See me at the counter when you’re done.”

She rushed down the stairs, taking two or even three steps at a time, before the anger could crawl into her voice. She didn’t need Jason to hear it, because it wasn’t directed at him.

 _Damn Bruce!_ Barbara mouthed the curse silently, ever-cautious as she had been taught. _Damn Bruce and his crusade. Damn Bruce and his single-minded focus._

She could only imagine how ecstatic Batman must have been to find Jason. Sure, Dick had thrown himself into the role of Robin with all his heart, once he had figured out that Batman was Bruce and Bruce was Batman, but before that, he had taken absolutely zero interest in it. And after... his enthusiasm for the job had come mostly from a place of dedication to Bruce, from the urge, the need to be useful and helpful and supportive and protective. He had only gradually extended that urge to everyone around him.

But Jason... Jason was already there. He was already living for the job. Not even two _fucking_ weeks in. Okay, maybe he really did like forensics and engineering, but that didn’t mean he had to focus on those, and yet he had. He was prioritizing what would be useful for Robin, not useful for Jason, and Bruce was probably going to be happy about that. She doubted he would openly show it, which was going to open a whole other can of worms, but there was no doubt in Barbara’s mind that Bruce would see absolutely nothing wrong with thirteen-year-old Jason Todd reading about the pattern of blood splatter from a cut carotid artery or the rate of decomposition under different environmental conditions.

God, she hoped he encouraged Jason to have at least some element of normalcy, outside of his school curriculum.

Barbara made a mental note to bring up the topic the next time she saw Bruce. She would tail him across every single rooftop in Gotham if he tried to get out of that conversation. Hell, she would even involve Dick and Alfred if that’s what it took. She was going to fix this, so help her heaven.

The employee computer at the reception booted with a slight rattle and a soft hum. Barbara punched in her credentials, then opened a new visitor file as well. Jason’s data was already firmly wedged into her brain, ever since Alfred had given her the rundown on who this new Robin-to-be was. The only thing missing was a picture. Barbara dug the library-owned phone out of the bottom drawer and set up all the necessary connections. Jason was probably going to argue. The least she could do was make sure it would only take five seconds.

It took another forty minutes until Jason finally descended from the top floor. The stack in his arms did not look to include forty-nine items, but it was still big enough to nearly hide his face.

“You could have told me you needed a hand.”

“‘cept I didn’ need one,” Jason lobbed back, but she could tell that it had been an effort, what with the redness on his face, the slight hitching of his breaths and the way he shook out his arms. Barbara rolled her eyes and started scanning.

There were fourteen books. Twenty-four if she counted the five issues of each _The American Forensic Journal_ and _Neuroscience Monthly_ separately. Half the books were in those same fields, 101s and introductory material, no doubt to facilitate reading of the journals. The other half came from a variety of different fields – engineering, architecture, zoology, human biology. There was a distinct lack of anything related to social sciences in there, but that was hardly surprising. The streets had done a pretty good job of teaching Jason not to be social.

Barbara portioned the books into two evenly weighted stacks and double-bagged them for easy carrying. Then she turned to Jason once more. “Alright. Now I just need your picture.”

“My what?”

“Your picture.” She held up the phone. “All Gotham library IDs are photographic. I just need one quick shot.”

Jason swallowed hard. “Do I really fuckin’ have to?”

“Do you want your books or not?”

Barbara watched his gaze swerve back and forth between the phone and the books. She could all but see the angel and devil on his shoulders arguing back and forth about whether all that knowledge was worth facing the awful flash of the camera. In the end, Jason sighed.

“Fine. Do it.”

She didn’t need him to tell her twice. Barbara snapped the photo quickly and brought up the picture on her computer. Cutting and saving only took ten seconds, the upload into the database another thirty. She sent the print request and told Jason to wait a minute.

The magnetic stripe card printer was in a separate room – which looked like little more than a broom closet from the outside – behind a separate lock. Barbara swiped her own employee card and unlocked the door, then made sure it locked behind her. Magnetic card printers were expensive, more than a thousand bucks a piece, and while she was sure Jason wasn’t going to try and lift the machine, this was not a security habit to break. Technically, she should not even be here on her own. No-one was to use this room unless someone else was covering the reception.

The card was done within two minutes. Barbara wasn’t entirely sure what the big fuss about the photo had been, because Jason did actually look rather nice in it except for the fully apparent displeasure on his face, but she wasn’t going to argue. Not when he had cooperated so much.

The rest was easy. Barbara made sure to lock the printer room properly, swiped Jason’s card through the reader to upload the book data, and handed it back to Jason while she shut down all the programs on her work PC. Sometime while she had been gone, Jason had retrieved their jackets and other belongings from the locker room. Barbara slipped into her jacket quickly and ushered Jason out the door, before locking down the building just before ten thirty.

The Urbarail ride back to her apartment was quiet, but Barbara did not mind. Jason was lost in one of his books, _An Introduction to Psychology_. It was a far cry from the ride to the library, during which Jason had watched everything and everyone on the train as if someone was going to rob or murder him any second (or possibly both). Now, Jason was lost in the world of knowledge, in a world of paper and ink, letters and numbers, and while his brow still furrowed in annoyance occasionally, he was no longer radiating misery like he had had when dealing with lions and witches and wardrobes. As a matter of fact, she could have sworn there was a hint of a smile on his lips now.

“Jason?”

“Yes?” Jason didn’t look up, but Barb brushed it off. Alfred was certainly already going to be Jason’s manners police. He didn’t need her to join.

“How’s your book? Enjoying it?”

Now this made him look up. And study her face. It was as if he was trying to figure out whether this was a trap or a test or something.

Apparently, Jason settled on ‘or something’.

“Yeah. It’s real good.”


End file.
